James Bond at 50: The Guy Keeps Getting Younger and Younger

Thursday

Nov 15, 2012 at 3:15 AM

I’m looking forward to seeing “Skyfall,” the new James Bond movie.

I’m hoping to see the movie this weekend with a friend. My wife, Valerie, is uninterested in the film, even though British actress Judi Dench reportedly has significant screen time as M. Valerie enjoys Dench’s performances and is a bit of an Anglophile. Such love for all things English seems to stop at 007’s doorstep, however.

Fair enough. No date-night for Valerie and me. Perhaps we will have to wait for Valentine’s Day, which is when the latest “Die Hard” movie hits theaters. But I have a hunch I’ll be seeing that one on Feb. 15 instead.

I’ve seen all the Bond movies. Growing up, I caught most of the Roger Moore flicks on HBO or at the movies and preferred him as 007. Sean Connery? That was my father’s James Bond. How little I knew as a child and teenager.

I wised up after college. About 15 years ago, I set out to watch every single Bond movie, from the first one, “Dr. No,” from the early 1960s, up through “Goldeneye,” with Pierce Brosnan. My 007 marathon woke me up to the fact that when it comes to James Bond, there’s Sean Connery, and then there’s everyone else. Daniel Craig, the current 007, is earning a place quite near Connery, but that’s as close as any of the other actors have come, if you ask me.

But that’s not to pan the others who have worn the superspy’s tuxedoes, have flirted with Miss Moneypenny, and have taken their martinis shaken, not stirred. Oh, and yeah, have saved the world from megalomaniacal villains a zillion times.

George Lazenby, who played Bond once, had the series’ one emotional scene before Daniel Craig arrived a few years ago and gave the franchise the dramatic chops and psychological depth it had never known. In “Her Majesty’s Secret Service,” Lazenby got to portray Bond as brokenhearted after the death of his wife.

Roger Moore’s insouciance and cheesy one-liners were well-suited to the same gaudy decade that gave us Disco and plaid pants in the 1970s. Timothy Dalton took over in the late 1980s and gave us a darker, more chaste and joyless Bond, but I enjoyed both of his stints, in “The Living Daylights” and “Licence to Kill.”

When Pierce Brosnan became Bond, everyone seemed to agree he and 007 were a perfect match. I was not necessarily a fan of Brosnan — I watched “Moonlighting,” with Bruce Willis and Cybill Shepherd in the 1980s, and had no interest in “Remington Steele,” as far as detective shows went — but agreed he was a good pick for Bond. His run as 007 started well with “Goldeneye” but bottomed-out in “Die Another Day,” a fun flick but one so forgettable that I had to pause here and look up the title.

I used to be quite the little wit when I went to see James Bond movies as a teenager and college student. You know how every Bond movie opens with him walking toward the center of the screen and then turning toward the camera and firing a bullet right at the audience? Well, I used to hunch over, clutch my gut, and let out a comical arrrrgggghhh. You know. As though Bond had shot me. I would only put on this shtick loud enough for my friends to hear; I never mistook myself as so funny that I thought the whole audience had to put up with me too. I gave up the act around the time Brosnan came into the picture.

I’ve read a few of Ian Fleming’s Bond books over the years. “Casino Royale” and “Moonraker” are two that come to mind. Physically, Sean Connery seems most to embody Bond as Fleming had created him. By all other counts, though, Daniel Craig nails Bond’s grit, psychological scars, world-wariness and attitude.

The James Bond series turns 50 this year. It’s a tribute to the character’s longevity that “Skyfall” is enjoying the biggest box office and some of the best reviews in the series’ history.

I think Bond continues to thrive because of all the action heroes, he’s the one that consistently captures what I think is at the heart of the genre. When you get right down to it, guys like these movies because they show one man single-handedly saving the day. We men daydream about such adventures; it’s why we never stop the car and ask for directions. In the real world, however, we know that proactive team work and diplomacy are how most things get done; in the world of Bond, though, one man has it all and does it all.

Think about it. In the earlier movies of Sylvester Stallone, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Bruce Willis and sometimes Harrison Ford, they virtually saved the day on their own, relying on their strengths, smarts, charm and wit. (The heroes of the tried-and-true buddy-cop flicks are an obvious exception.) As these actors have gotten older, though, they’ve been paired with younger sidekicks or surrounded by others their age, and together, they get things done. Stallone’s “Expendable” movies are the perfect example of what I mean; it takes a dirty dozen of action stars to defeat the bad guys in those flicks.

Fifty years later, though, Bond goes it alone to this day.

The secret?

They keep hiring younger guys to play him.

Shawn P. Sullivan is the editor of the Sanford News. He can be reached at ssullivan@sanfordnews.com.